Posted 25th February 2019Olympic Games Paris 2024 - a meassage from the WKF President

On 21st February we have received the hard news that the Paris 2024 Organising Committee has not proposed Karate as an additional sport to the IOC.

First and foremost, I want you to know that the WKF is not going to give up on this obstacle. WKF has never done so facing adversity and this is not going to be an exception.

Last Friday 22nd February, one day after, I have met in Lausanne with the IOC President and I have asked him, also in writing after the meeting, that the IOC requests Paris 2024 to reassess its proposal to IOC, including Karate as an additional sport. Fundamentally, based on the tremendous strength and quality of this sport in France and that it is absolutely not acceptable to exclude Karate before being evaluated in Tokyo 2020.

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The proposal to the IOC is of the exclusive responsibility of Paris 2024, as President Bach has stated to me during the meeting. I am in permanent contact with the French Karate Federation and we both are aware that it is in France where the Karate of the country has to and I am sure will indeed react to the issue as it deserves.

Nevertheless, the moment of truth has arrived for the rest of our 195 National Federations around the world. I am asking you to request your National Olympic Committees and your Sports Ministries to address the IOC and Paris 2024 Organising Committee to request a rectification of an incomprehensible decision and to add Karate as an additional sport proposed for Paris 2024. This needs to happen now, as time is of the essence and this is a unique occasion to demonstrate that we are right when we say how big and how universal Karate is. Social campaigns will also be of great help and they are already being put in place around the entire world.

Rest assured that the WKF is already doing at its level all in their hands to revert a decision, which is unfair, unnecessary and hard to understand and so damaging for our sport. However, there is always a positive part, which is what matters now: we have the historic opportunity to demonstrate what we have always been proud of: Much more than a sport, a social movement of great dimension in the entire world and in this case, also and very prominently in France.